On Father’s Day, people tend to think about cards, cookouts, and family photos on the fridge. Out in the Callaghan Complex, the themes play out in a very different way — written in hoofprints, dust, and the space between a stallion and his son.

Big Bay and Curly Ear Joe

If you’ve followed our work for any length of time, you know that stallions are not the caricatures they’re often made out to be. They are defenders, yes. But they are also teachers, guardians, and sometimes the quiet center of a family.

“Big Bay” is one of those stallions.

His son, “Curly Ear Joe,” is over two years now. In wild horse culture, that means the clock has run out on his time as a colt in the family band. Young males have to leave. They learn how to be bachelors, how to survive without the safety of the family they have known, and someday, if they’re strong and lucky, how to build families of their own.

By the time you see a band stallion run a young male off, there’s been a long build‑up of subtle signals — discipline, tolerance, pressure, and finally a line the youngster cannot cross. Young males can often follow their families a long time, not seeming to understand it is “time to grow up.” It is a very hard time.

The sequence of photographs we’re sharing shows a part of that story we were fortunate enough to view close enough to capture even the look in the eyes of father and son.

Curly Ear Joe is not a big, swaggering bachelor (even though his daddy is one of the largest wild horses in this area). He is still uncertain, still finding his place. And just over the rise, never too close and never too far, his father remains within sight.

It is as tender a Father’s Day scene as anything a movie script could stage  — only this one is happening in a real landscape that is about to be hit by the largest wild horse removal scheduled this year.

The place they call home

Big Bay and Curly Ear Joe live in the Callaghan Complex — more than 1.1 million acres of public land in central Nevada. On paper, it looks like a vast, almost empty space.

On the ground, it’s another story.

This is a landscape where:

• Appropriate management levels (AMLs) were drawn to match old administrative lines, not how horses actually use the country.

• Key water sources have been left to decay or fenced out of reach of wild horses and wildlife.

• Mining and associated water drawdowns have grown and spread without honest, herd‑specific analysis.

For nearly two decades, we have tried to get these issues addressed where they belong: in planning. First, we were told a new land use plan would fix things. It didn’t. Then we were told an HMAP would do the job. Work on that plan started more than ten years ago. It was quietly dropped when it became politically inconvenient.

Now, after all that delay, BLM has approved a new plan for the complex that does not repair water, does not reevaluate AMLs, and does not grapple with habitat and mining impacts. It does one thing very well: it sets up a massive removal.

Under this BLM approved and active plan, BLM intends to drive the population across the complex down to just 323 wild horses on more than a million acres. The first operation, slated to begin in weeks, seeks to remove roughly 2,000 horses from a population the agency estimates (and targets) at over 5,000 — without even telling the public how many will be taken from each herd management area. The BLM explains nothing. They do not even explain why their counts in these HMAs deviate to the extreme with growth rates in these ranging from +113% in one year to -78% in another year. There is no actual “pre-gather inventory.”

Father’s Day and the last step of advocacy

It is easy, especially on social media, to say “we’re fighting for Callaghan.” It’s harder to explain what that actually means at this stage.

There is a long chain of advocacy for wild horses:

• Getting Congress to pass the Wild Free‑Roaming Horses and Burros Act.

• Pushing agencies to write better policies and guidance.

• Commenting on land use plans and draft EAs.

• Pressing for welfare standards, habitat protections, and real AML evaluations.

All of that work matters. It sets the frame.

But public lands decisions — including wild horse decisions — are ultimately applied herd by herd, place by place. They land in a specific environmental assessment, a specific gather plan, a specific HMAP, a specific record.

When a bad plan is locked in and a roundup is scheduled, a site‑specific lawsuit becomes the last step of advocacy for that herd.

That is where we are now in Callaghan. 

Wild Horse Education did not stop at statements.

• We filed a federal lawsuit challenging the Callaghan Complex HMAP/Gather Plan.

• We followed with a motion for preliminary injunction to try to rein in the upcoming removal.

• We are preparing for final briefing and a hearing, while also planning to be on the range when the helicopters arrive so any welfare violations or deviations from the plan can be documented and brought into court quickly.

This is not a generic “fight for wild horses.” It is a focused, time‑sensitive defense of the herds that share the same country as Big Bay and Curly Ear Joe.

Not a talking point

We are in the real-time, herd-specific, defense of the herd. We are way beyond any programmatic or funding bill request Congress may or may not endorse a year from now.

On Father’s Day, watching Big Bay keep a quiet eye on his son, it’s hard not to think about his devotion and effort to keep his family safe. 

He cannot stop every threat that comes over the horizon. But he does what he can, exactly where he is, for the family he knows.

Our turn

“I have been advocating for these herds for nearly 20 years — trying to get the planning right, the habitat respected, the waters repaired, and the AMLs grounded in reality instead of convenience. I watched BLM start down that road and then veer away, over and over. To see them now use a generic complex‑level plan to justify hollowing out the largest herd left on U.S. rangeland is not just frustrating. It is a betrayal of everything that matters.” ~ Laura Leigh, founder of Wild Horse Education

Big Bay has watched over his family as best he can.

This Father’s Day, it is our turn to watch over his.

Not with slogans. Not with borrowed headlines. But with the work that actually matters now: holding BLM to account in the administrative process, in federal court, and on the ground.

Because Callaghan is not a talking point or an abstract. It is their home. It is their very lives. 

Every court case we bring, every mile we travel to cover roundups or assess a herd, every win, every action we take is only possible because of your support.

Thank you!